Those Silly Elves
by KuramaKitty
Summary: "The customer was pure American, strange to see in the middle of Japan, without having the added oddity of seeking help from a Paranormal Researcher." Young girls are disappearing frequently in the United States? Shibuya Psychic Research is on the case!


Disclaimer: I do not own Fuyumi Ono's Ghost Hunt nor do I own Clare B. Dunkle's, _The Hollow Kingdom Trilogy_.

**A quick Ghost Hunt summary for you guys who are here from the The Hallow Hill Lodge forum September challenge:** Ghost Hunt is pretty much what it sounds like, there are a certain number of cases in the whole series, I believe it's about nine. The main character is a high school girl named Mai Taniyama who loves telling ghost stories with her friends. One day she comes across Kazuya Shibuya and Lin Koujo, paranormal investigators. When Mai breaks one of their cameras and Lin's arm, Shibuya has Mai fill in for his assistant while he's in the hospital and can't work. Kazuya quickly receives the nickname "Naru," as in "Naru the Narcissist" from Mai because he is so narcissistic. Then they meet Ayako Matsuzaki, a shrine maiden, Houshou Takigawa, a monk, (usually referred to as Monk), John Brown, a nineteen year old, Australian, Catholic Priest, and Masako Hara, a spirit medium who is also a very famous TV star.

Sound interesting? It is! I definitely recommend it for everyone, it's not that gorey and scary enough to keep your heart rate up but nothing worse, a tiny bit of love interest going on, and really funny and cute. For a better summary and a background of all the characters, search for Absolute Anime on Google and type in Ghost Hunt in their search engine, it should pop right up.

Enough about that. This is for the September forum challenge under the forum The Hallow Hill Lodge under Clare B. Dunkle. Enjoy!

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><p>"Thank you for meeting with me. My name is Michael Timpan." The customer was pure American, strange to see in the middle of Japan, without having the added oddity of seeking help from a Paranormal Researcher.<p>

As he shook hands with each of them, Michael studied the two young men and young woman standing in front of him. Shibuya Kazuya, or rather "Naru" as the young woman had called him, seemed far too young to even have graduated from high school already, let alone own and run Shibuya Psychic Research with two employees under him: a brown-haired girl surely not out of high school and an older man who was taking notes on a laptop while Michael spoke and looked more the part of a boss than this seventeen year-old boy. But he had heard that this boy had a very successful ghost hunting business, which is why he went so far out of his way to visit with them.

"And why have you decided to visit? However successful this business may be, we are not a tourist attraction." That's Kazuya for you. Five foot, nine inches of pure narcissism. Ergo: "Naru the Narcissist" as his friends so lovingly call him.

_What a jerk!_ "Naru! That was extremely rude!" To Mr. Timpan, Mai Taniyama bows and says, "I'm very sorry Mr. Timpan. Please, let us know why you decided to call on us."

"Oh no, no! It's no trouble. It's really not an altogether inappropriate question, I assure you." Michael waved her apology away then turned to the boss to explain himself.

"I am from a small town in Washington State called Bayette of the United States of America. It is not a long way from the Cascade Mountains, and has been occupied for the past one hundred and fifty years or so." As if on cue, he shifts on the couch and his expression becomes defeated, different from his matter-of-fact demeanor not thirty seconds ago. "Over the last one hundred and fifty years, however, many young girls have disappeared without a trace. Usually the disappearances are limited to no more than two months at a time, spaced out forty to fifty years between each event. The only common factor among every girl is that they are all between the ages of sixteen and nineteen."

"I see. And why do you seek help from a Paranormal Investigator? Why not go to the police?" Naru, blue eyes intent on the blonde haired, blue eyed American, asked.

Michael wrung his hands, looking more and more distressed by the minute, "We have appealed to the police, even as recently as two weeks ago. That was when two girls of seventeen disappeared, but the police have no more clues to the disappearances as do the rest of us. There's no denying the disappearances are related somehow, but it's like nothing anyone has ever seen. There are no other factors other than the age, there have been girls from Bayette, but even girls visiting from as far away as Maine have been taken as well. Blondes, brunettes, redheads, Native Americans, Caucasians, no one is safe. If it were a serial killer, not only would it be someone of exceptional psychopathy to take such a wide range of young women, but there's also the fact that these disappearances are over a time span of one hundred and fifty years."

"While unusual, a truly disturbed individual who has no obvious preference of women other than age is not necessarily impossible, and neither is the possibility that this psychosis has been passed down to further generations," Naru replied, almost interested with the facts but not willing to accept a case that does not have paranormal roots. He leaned forward in his seat and rested his elbows on his knees, his laced fingers showing only Naru's focused blue eyes.

"Besides, even if you were convinced these disappearances were paranormal, why come all the way to Japan? Surely there are investigators in the United States closer to where you guys are than us," Mai asked, just as interested in the case as her boss. The other assistant, Michael noticed, was not so inclined to ask his own questions as Mai. He was content to let his much younger boss conduct the meeting.

"Our town has hired other paranormal groups to investigate, but everyone has been as unsuccessful as our police force. We had no choice but to look elsewhere because everyone is convinced this is paranormal." Michael leaned forward in his seat as well. So many times had he explained this case to similar groups. Some had accepted this case, but many had ignored him, delivering the same excuses of this Naru boy. He could not bring himself to give up on this case, on the girls who have disappeared, but he also could not fight the feeling of resignation of another failed attempt at finding the conclusion of this chapter in his beloved town's history.

"Some of the girls have been known to go into the forested mountains for a walk and never come back, but whenever we'd send in K9 units, they'd never be able to find the scent, even if it had not rained in a few days. Some girls have also disappeared from their homes, where there has been no evidence of forced entry, nor of struggle. Not a hair, not a fingerprint, not a boot print left behind. Never. That is virtually unheard of in this day and age with all the technology police have nowadays." He ran a hand down his face and sighed deeply, knowing his next explanation was his last chance to convince this bizarre group of researchers to accept his case. "The strangest part is that relatives of some of the girls have shown very unusual traits after a disappearance. Some go insane, some insist a monster or a goblin have kidnapped the girl to take as a bride underground, some are never able to utter a word again, and some, even stranger, have strange compulsions. To walk forever, to never lie, to believe they are a cat or a dog or a horse. We feel this is not a coincidence, but are not sure how this ties in with the case."

At last finished with his story, Michael sat in complete silence, waiting for Naru to give his answer.

Naru first stared up at his assistant's unrelenting expression, eyes narrowed, arms crossed, lips pursed, then turned to his other employee. Finally, he addressed his client. "Mr. Timpan, I'll need directions to Bayette, Washington and a building and a room to set up base. You can expect us there on five days from now."

An excited gasp filled the room, "Really Naru?"

Michael froze, shocked, unbelieving of his luck.

"Yes Mai, weren't you listening?" He earned a furious glare from his most expressive employee, whose twitching fingers wanted nothing more than to throttle her sarcastic, egotistic boss, but nonetheless still commanded his assistants with indifference. "Mai, call Miss Matsuzaki and Miss Hara. Lin, call Father Brown and Takigawa. They will be joining us in America."

Resolving to not let Naru ruin her happiness, Mai rolled her eyes, broke out into a grin and saluted Naru, "Yes sir!" She walked into another room to use the phone while Lin saved his notes and followed up on his boss's orders as well.

…

Deep underneath the Cascade Mountain range, Marak Tigereye was frustrated. As if he didn't have enough problems on his hands, dealing with a brand new King's Wife with a name much deserving of her manner. Silence had barely uttered one word to him since the night of their ceremony. He knew she wasn't mute; far from it. Taya, that friend of hers, can bring such beautiful words out of her mouth and yet, no matter what the Goblin King does for her, her lips remain closed. Yes, that would be the most prevalent problem on his hands right now, if not for the happenings outside his kingdom.

Ever since the Elf King named Aganir Lina'mir died before his son was even out of diapers, their people had been sloppy. That fact that Elf King appointed a fool for an advisor had not helped the people overcome their King's early death. That had been a few years ago, and Marak had had to agree upon a treaty declaring not to take any more elf brides for the moment. A very frustrating development but one that could not be helped so there were still Elf Brides to be stolen later. And now, Marak had to bail the elves out again. If only he had use for an elf bride now. He could negotiate for one in return for his help.

Then he wondered if an elven King's Wife would be easier to handle than his own. Maybe it was a good thing that he had a human for a King's Wife. Either way, his involvement in the elves' mistakes was inevitable now.

Of all things, humans had managed to catch an elf on video camera! And the silly elves hadn't even realized until they overheard the humans reviewing the tape. Of course, they tried to fix their own mistake but ended up making an even bigger mess of things. The warriors sent were still too young and so poorly trained in magic that the humans had managed to defeat them. Now the humans were back in town and heavily guarded, which meant that the Goblin King had to retrieve that tape before both the elves' – and by extension the goblins' – secrets were exposed for the world of humans to see.

He called for his military commander and chief advisor, two goblins named Tahr and Brook. Tahr could pass as a normal human if it were for the yellow-green scales covering his body and the tail that constantly twitched behind him at every sensation. Brook's ears were distinctly elf-like, his talons less so. His black-feathered wings protruding from his shoulder blades made it difficult to tailor the pitch black uniforms the King and his guards always wear.

"Brook, is Silence with Taya?" The King asked his chief advisor. When Marak took Silence to be his King's Wife, he married Brook off to her friend, Taya whom he captured along with Silence.

"I believe so King. They seem inseparable together… I don't even get to talk to her during the day," Brook sighed. He'd been having as hard a time with his new wife and his King had been having with his. Taya seemed determined to avoid him as much as possible. She refused to share his bed, pretended to be asleep when he was in the same room, and spent as much time with Silence as she possibly could. Both he and the King were concerned that they weren't getting enough food to eat or sleep at night. He usually was praised on the fact that he rarely ever even felt emotion, let alone shown it but he couldn't deny this whole "wife" situation was irritating to say the least.

"I don't believe I've ever seen the two of them apart." Tahr had been serving the King ever since Marak Tigereye could remember. Marak's father, Marak Redfur had appointed him as the youngest ever military commander of his time. During Marak Redfur's time, he had married a reluctant elf at the same time Marak Redfur took his elf bride. Tahr seemed to think himself lucky that he had already overcome his elf's shyness and had made her happy over the years, and amused himself by his younger companions horror stories.

"That's true," Marak sighed, running his hand through his hair. One of these days he'll put his silent wife's fears to rest, but now was not the time. He composed himself and stood as straight as he could, perking his black-striped orange ears up and swishing his tail behind him. Even though goblins prided themselves on being strong and grotesque instead of weak and pretty, the Goblin King still felt those qualities leaned toward the latter qualities, especially combined with the five whisker strands on each side of his nose. "I suppose today is a good day to let our wives spend time together while we are gone."

Tahr and Brook straightened to listen. "Gone where, my King?" Tahr asked.

"We have a problem, with possibly larger consequences than ever before." Tigereye folded his arms behind his back and began to pace. Tahr would tell him that that trait reminded him of the previous king and of the king before that as told to him by Redfur. "Those silly elves have gotten themselves into another predicament they can't get themselves out of. A group of humans managed to catch evidence of their existence on video camera."

"And we have to go retrieve the camera and erase those humans' memories." Brook crossed his arms and his eyes acquired that glazed-over look he always got when he thought of possible strategies to help his king.

"Correct." The King stopped pacing and faced his advisors, waiting on their opinions.

Tahr smirked, happy to finally have something to do. He had always heard from tales of previous military commanders that times of peace were hardest on commanders' mind. That wasn't to say they weren't happy in times of peace, just that they began to get restless without a project to occupy themselves on. These last few years had been just that, and now he'll get to do what he does best: plan and carry out a mission.

A few hours later of arguing and hammering out details, they had the necessary men and equipment to succeed in their mission. They planned to be back within the hour.

…

The Goblin King and his men stole through the night, disguising themselves as regular humans. Even at night, in town the streetlamps can still illuminate their features enough to tell that the seven faces under the black hoods aren't entirely human.

When they came upon the lodge where the pesky humans were staying, they split up according to the plan. The Goblin King and two guards positioned themselves outside the room where they knew the women of the group were staying while Tahr, Brook, and another two guards slipped around the corner of the hotel toward the room of the guy's. The Goblin King whispered the Unlock Spell and used his magic to silences any sound the window sliding against the frame would have made.

All three goblins climbed in the window, the Goblin King focusing his magic on sending the girls into a deeper sleep. From there, the Goblin King and a guard were supposed to find the video tape and destroy it, but before the Goblin King could even finish his Sleeping Spell, the girl with the short brown hair abruptly sat up, screaming to wake all of Marak's many ancestors.

…

Ayako and Masako woke up just as suddenly and screamed just as deafeningly. Once Ayako saw the strange cloaked men in the room, she began chanting the Nine Cuts, "_Rin, pyou, tou, shah, kai, jin, retsu, zai, zen!"_ Once Mai recovered from whatever made her scream, she jumped up and made the Seal of the Immovable One, _"Nanmaku san bazara dan kan, nanmaku san bazara dan kan."_ Thankfully, John and Monk appeared in the doorway soon after and Monk chanted, _"On kiri kiri bazara!"_

With all the chanting, one would think that the words they always chant to drive off spirits would work against these late-night intruders. Come to think of it, Mai realized that when they tried staving off those elf-like creatures in the woods where they camped for evidence, it didn't work then either. Lin's shiki seemed to be the only thing that worked against these creatures!

One of the cloaked figured turned to run out the window, but Masako was right there and fought him off with a desk drawer. However, it wasn't fazed long enough for Lin and Naru to capture it, instead he grabbed Masako around the waist and dragged her out the window with him.

…

"Masako!" He heard, referring to the now screaming Japanese girl he had thrown over his shoulder. When he heard one of the men scream, "Mai!" he turned his head to look back briefly. He noticed all six of his men had managed to get out unharmed, and Tahr had taken the other young girl. She was screaming and beating on his back as this girl, Masako, was doing to him. Before he turned back, he noticed other members of the group scrambling out the window to give chase.

The Goblin King had to decide quick on whether to keep the girls or not. All of his men were either already married or too young, and he had no use for a human girl otherwise.

Behind the group of goblins was a very loud, shrill whistle. Three spheres of light shot past the entire group and blocked off their escape. The goblins turned around and faced off with the humans.

"Let the women go," the tall Chinese man commanded. The balls of light moved threateningly closer to the goblins.

Marak noticed the movement out of the corner of his eye. Masako was still struggling and spitting mad. And he wasn't entirely sure those lights could really hurt he and his guards, but he had underestimated these humans once.

Then, he realized.

A perfect solution to his problems!

"Fine," The Goblin King agreed. The humans looked relieved and wary at the same time. Smart. "But on one condition."

"And what would that be?" The short Japanese male stepped forward, asserting himself as the leader.

"I want all evidence of the elf you saw erased." Everyone in the clearing stilled, waiting for the humans' answer.

"Agreed." No sooner had he agreed than every human fell unconscious, the goblins using their magic to erase their minds and finally put an end to this nights' events. He sent a guard to fetch the tape, and they set off toward their kingdom.

…

Once the humans woke up, they simply believed that they weren't able to find any evidence of any sort of paranormal happenings. Naru was forced to believe that there were several serial killers operating through the generations. Michael, while refusing to give up the theory of a paranormal explanation, could not blame the group of paranormal investigators. He saw them off with a smile, paid them, and thanked them for their time.

…

Happy with the outcome, the Goblin King was able to sweep the problem under the rug and forget all about the group of human investigators. Unfortunately, that isn't to say that he wasn't worry-free. No, he still had a stubborn human bride to deal with. A stubborn girl who was friends with another stubborn girl in his kingdom under the mountains.

He stood up from his perch on a city bench where he had kept an eye on the humans since dusk had fallen. He was about ready to return home when a storefront caught his attention. He traveled toward it, unable to shake the idea from his mind. When he walked into the shop, he looked around at all the beautiful flowers. Sunflowers, hydrangeas, tulips, red, orange, pink, the choices were exhaustive. His eyes fell on a bouquet of dark blue roses. He couldn't help remembering the conversation he overheard when Silence told Taya about these gorgeous blue roses she had seen in a florist shop and how much she wished she had a boyfriend to give them to her.

_Flowers were generally something to ease an elf bride's transition into the underground kingdom,_ Marak thought as he paid for the flowers. _But maybe these blue roses can mean as much to my King's Wife._

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><p>Hi! I hope you listened to me and enjoyed my story. I hope it was okay, I like the idea I had, using Ghost Hunt to cross over with The Hollow Kingdom and I felt it was the one that I knew of that would be stitched seamlessly in with Hollow Kingdom in this particular challenge. I hope I had a good balance of both fics, but I don't think I did. Since it was for a Hollow Kingdom challenge, I felt weird putting in so much of another fic but, for the sake of a crossover, didn't want to put in too little. I hope it turned out all right.<p>

And if you're at all curious, I'm really hoping to also start my own Hollow Kingdom series, using all the Hollow Kingdom-connected characters, so that includes Marak Tigereye, Brook, Fahr, Silence, and Taya. I'm also leaning toward putting Michael in there somewhere actually. He was a character I had created just for this one-shot challenge, but as I was writing him, I began to like him a lot so I'm thinking about making a spot for him somewhere...

Anyway, if you happen to have anything to say, I would love to hear them in the form of a review! PM's are okay too, I guess if you want. But all of you who are reading this as a result of The Hallow Hill Lodge forum challenge I was talking about, don't forget to go back and vote! Cya!

P.S. I'm sorry if there are series discrepancies... I tried to keep it as true as possible, and I'm sorry if I strayed. Let me know if you spot something though, I'd love to know for later!


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